Queen's Day - I love you Amsterdam!

If you were ever going to spend 66 hours in Amsterdam. This would be it. Queens Day is a spectacle of mammoth proportions. This from the web;

"Queen's Day (in Dutch: Koninginnedag) in Amsterdam is a unique night and day carnival-like event on 30th of April each year and during the night before – so called Queen's Night (in Dutch: Koninginnenacht). What is special about the Queen's Day, as well as having elements of the huge party across the whole city, it is combined with the market in the streets of the whole city (in Dutch: Vrijmarkt). Queen's Day in Amsterdam attracts each year ca 700 thousands visitors, which makes the city crowded beyond any acceptable norms. Despite overcrowding, the atmosphere on Queen's Day is traditionally relaxed and joyful. Usually mild, not too hot weather makes the Queen's Day the day to be in Amsterdam. To feel the atmosphere on the day please, watch the Queen's Day video .

Queen's Day is also a typical occasion for the world-famous Orange Craze. On this day most of the people wear orange clothing and creative orange accessories. The colour orange is a ubiquitous sight, referring to the name of our royal family, the House of Orange. Everywhere in the city you'll see orange banners, orange colored foods and drinks."



Every street, every square, every canal and every boat is jam-packed with people all wearing orange, all partying and dancing along to the ubiqiutous music pumping through the beer and smoke. I was there last year but this year promised to be even more special. At the last minute, myself and Keg (a friend working in the hostel in Venice with me but originally from Miami) found a pretty cheap ticket to an airport an hour from Brussels. This meant we would have to travel for 12 hours each way, but were confident that was a very small endurance. The juice would definately be worth the squeeze.

Classically, our journey was a fiasco, we woke up an hour late sprinted for our bus, and just made our plane after paying a huge fee to print our boarding passes at the airport (thank you Ryan Air). We did, however, have hours worth of entertainment ridiculing Keg's packing - for three days he decided to bring four pairs of pants,one pair of shorts, 2 shirts and no underwear or socks all in a plastic shopping bag. Dammit Keg!

One of the best times Ive ever had was when I worked on the pub crawl in Amsterdam last year. The Ultimate Party pub crawl attracts close to 2000 revelers every week in summer. Our job was to promote the pub crawl in the day, which entailed cruising around with friends chatting to tourists and persuading them to come party with you, exploring the red light district and then meeting up with the crew at our regular bar for something to eat and drink before the night began. The night was a dream. We would go around pouring vodka shots into the people's mouths, handing out t-shirts, putting on wristbands and all that jazz. Our duties for the night were to dance, drink and socialise and show everyone where the bars and clubs were. We got paid for this. It was a freaky dream.
Our first two nights and days in Amsterdam were spent catching up with the Pub Crawl crew and partying with them. Met up with all the old friends from across the globe and the new additions to the staff. Travelling relatively alone can be tiresome and lonesome at times so it was an awesome two days catching up with all the boys leading up to the main event of Queen's Day.

We woke up scatter-brained and pumped up for the day but we took an age to get into town. On the walk in we found an orange cowboy hat with holes in the peak to put six beer glasses. SOLD! As soon as we had poured the beer we had into the cups we decided to catch a packed tram into town. This proved to be a semi-mistake. Not far into the tram ride I got a tap on the shoulder from a grumpy dwarf lady with grey brown hair and a scowl telling me my beer was all over her little angel. Her little angel, equally grumpy and equally unpleasant to look at seemed completely dry. My drop of beer on her top was difficult to detect. She moaned and hollered and I unenthusiastically apologised. Chill out bitch its Queens Day. A friend with us from back home, Natti-Ice, giggled uncontrollably for the rest of the ride. We weren't in the right mindset to deal with vibe-killing mongrels.

The Pub Crawl boss has a little bachelor pad on Leidsestraat, the main walking street, and had a shindig there in the day with a DJ deck, a view of the throbbing crowds and unlimited beer. We partied there, writing on each others shirts and faces, taking turns DJing and getting into the beer and soon set off for our mission around the festival. En route we spotted two small sisters seling megaphones and bubbleguns. In a moment of weakness I bought the bubblegun only to find out I was duped because it still needed batteries. This travesty was soon overlooked as we discovered our intended destination. In front of the Massive Rijks Museum across the canal and under some trees there was a stage and a DJ playing some crowd-pleasing beats. We were settling in to this place spreading the love and giving out free high-fives when Cat, a livewire Scottish girl, went to give a stranger a high-five celebrating the occasion and the glorious day and he promptly punched her in the face. This asshole was laughing about it when our group of guys was trying to get at him. Nicky, an explosive Irishman who I shared a room with last year, was the most riled up and in his steaming he knocked a girl a few times and so she spat in his face, he then spat in her face. Clearly the vibe here was wrong, we left soon after that.

The main attraction of the day was Tiesto in Museumplein. Tiesto has been voted the best DJ in the world three years in a row, he is considered a pioneer and revolutionised the the DJing scene. In 2008 he became the first DJ to perform at the O2 arena in London as part of his In Search of Sunrise 7 summer tour. (By the way, In Search of Sunrise 8 is in Cape Town this year in 2 weeks on the 15th of May). So we headed to Museumplein to get a taste of the sensation. There were 150 000 people revved up and waiting for Tiesto. He arrived in a Limo and the big screen cameras followed him from the car through backstage onto the stage as the crowd went mad. He started playing as the sun was going down and finished when it was dark. Tiesto didn't disappoint and we spent alot of time on each other's shoulders taking in the crowd and the vibe. He played for only an hour and it went quickly but it was an electric experience. The rest of the night was spent bar-hopping and riding the wave of the day. It was a truly awesome three nights and days and if you are ever in Europe at this time of year, it is a must. Thank you Amsterdam!

The Gap Decade Theory - Recovering from my education

The Gap Decade Movement (GDM) is the notion, viral wave, underground phenomena, future dynamo and proposed practice of taking ten years out of one's life to decide what one would like to do with the rest of it. Ten years of personal freedom to explore all passions, all avenues of interest, the feint tickles at the underbelly of our desires, and especially the ludicrous, destined-to-fail personal projects. An expidition into possibility. It is not a strict rule of 3652.5 days but rather an extended period in which there is no rush nor pressure to 'become something' or make a success of one's self. It is a time to merely be, to appreciate the here and now, breathe it all in and savour the moment. A time to question, explore, experiment, experience, walk, run, dance, play, eat, love, learn, dare, taste, touch, smell, listen, argue, speak, write, read, draw, provoke, emote, scream, sin, repent, cry, kneel, pray, bow, rise, stand, look, laugh, cajole, create, confront, confound, walk back, walk forward, circle, hide, and seek.


Fresh graduates are naturally attracted to a decade of personal freedom to recover from their education, discover fresh paths, indulge in whims and go wherever the wind blows. Most importantly, however, it is about finding our passions and how that can change everything.



The world is shit
The GDM expresses a severe critique of modern society, blind conformity, the values,
and the systems of today's world and the general acceptance of our lives. This from their official website;

"We are all too accepting. We accept that university follows high school and that a career follows studying. We accept that money equals success and that we don't really have a choice in the matter. We accept that it is very important to 'become someone' and that the way to do this is through business. We, as the GDM, are critically aware of the inherent emptiness in the traditional notion of success."

The emphasis is on consumption and production, business and money, more business and more money. But why? As Jiddu Krishnamurti, an Indian philosopher, once said, "It is no measure of health to be well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society."



So if not business then what??
The GDM is not merely a dismissal of the world's current system but simultaneously champions an alternative approach to life focused on creativity, community, possibility and exploration. Although the GDM can easily be dismissed as a hippie brain-child, it is an attractive and surprisingly sensible notion. It is not a straight forward anti-conformity plea but rather a re-assessment of human potential plea. The GDM are passionate supporters of the belief that "Remarkable, life-enhancing things can happen when we take time out of our routines, rethink our paths, and revisit the passions we left behind (or never pursued at all) for whatever reason. We can take ourselves in fresh directions at nearly any point in our lives".

This gap decade, the GDM explains, is ideally used as a period of personal growth and development, a lengthy rite of passage for the experiencer to discover what they want from life and what they can offer.


My Thoughts
I read alot. I like to read all kinds of things mostly for simple joy and voyeurism and that one can learn amazing things from books. I read books that are thoughtful, insightful and provoking. This is what I have learnt from books;

- People get sucked into careers and end up trading in their dreams for bigger paychecks without even realising what they are doing. This is referred to as 'feeding the Career Monster'.

- Some people are lucky enough to snap out of this trap, escape the haunting of unrealised dreams and refresh their lives. Most aren't.

- If you advance confidently in the direction of your dreams, you will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. You will put some things behind, will pass an invisible boundary; new, universal, and more liberal laws will begin to establish themselves around and within you.

- True happiness is not found in external advantages such as material luxury, political power, or good health. True happiness lies in not being dependent on such fleeting things.


With that in mind, a time of personal exploration does not seem so ridiculous. In fact it seems like a healthy alternative to feeding the Career Monster and establishing a sense of security, bec ause as I have also learnt from living and books, 'nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future'.


Of course, it can be argued, that I am merely avoiding the real world and clutching at plausible excuses for doing so. I am avoiding growing up. I am clinging to my youth. And why not? Why not cling to all the laughter and desire and dancing and uncomplicated happiness. Why seek out commitment and security, mind-numbing, spirit-trampling careers that offer most people nothing but the promise of a nest egg and some safety.

I see the Gap Decade as a nice little reward following the 16 years dedicated towards my formal education. After so sensibly and diligently following the path of education it only made sense to make this decision. A personal indulgence of complete freedom for ten years. No commitments, no responsibilty but to myself. It could easily be dismissed as a slacker's dream, because it is. But there is nothing slacking about it. I am making the most of my time. I am going to use this little gift to see the world. I am going to search for paradise. It is true what they say; the world is wilder in all directions, more dangerous and bitter, more extravagant and bright. Another quote, this one from Paul Fussel;

"Before the development of tourism, travel was conceived to be like study, and its fruits were considered to be the adornment of the mind and the formation of judgement. The traveler was a student of what he saught."

The question is, what are you going to do with your gap decade? Your time before life gets too claustrophobic and demanding, before the thought of marriage and mortgages, before you get old. Are you going to burn up the rest of your youth, gaining experience in a field so you can one day retire a little early and travel to far away places to admire and wish you were younger so that you could do that hike or go to that party? Are you going to waste away your youth indoors at a desk or step outside and take a ride? All glory comes from daring to begin.

I can't seem to attach the video I want, but please go onto youtube and search for "Music and life - Alan Watts". It sums this all up perfectly. Cheers

Flooding in St. Mark's Square

As with most things, the vibe and mood of a hostel has a certain ebb and flow to it. At some stages the hostel can be full of Asians with a stream of absurd requests and fickle complaints as well as a constant aroma of burning noodles. At other times the hostel will brim with fun-loving travellers united in the single goal of experiencing a city and travelling at its glorious best. A month ago the hostel was going through a purple patch and experiencing the latter. There were two Aussie guys who were outrageously popular,a ditzy illustrator from Cornwall, a travel agent from Vancouver, three English teachers from Ireland living in Berlin and small clumps of like-minded Americans studying abroad who made up the nucleus of the hostel. After a series of nights out in the bars we decided to experience a spectacle unique to Venice first hand, the Acqua Alta. This from the ever-reliable Wikipedia;

Acqua Alta (high water in Italian) is the term used in Veneto for the exceptional tide peaks that occur periodically in the northern Adriatic Sea. The phenomenon occurs mainly between autumn and spring, when the astronomical tides are reinforced by the prevailing seasonal winds which hamper the usual reflux. To allow pedestrian circulation during floods, the city installs a network of gangways (wide wood planks on iron supports) reproducing the main urban paths.

Yeah, so basically at certain times like in winter and at a full moon, Venice floods. Not all of it but only certain areas that are closer to the water or at a lower level. The high tide was scheduled for 11:46pm so after dinner we got everyone together and set off to meet up with the other hostel. We arrived at the other hostel to find them doing flaming Sambuca shots. We joined in and then got prepared by handing out plastic bags for the guests to use to cover their feet. Our total of 7 bags was good for 3 and a half people, so everyone decided to just man up and go bare foot. Everyone besides me and Beard, the other hostel worker, who had good old Wellingtons. The water was freezing so I wasn't willing to go barefoot. Beard, another friend from the Amsterdam pub crawl, decided to lead us on his special route.
His special route ignored all pedestrian signs and inspired by the flaming Sambuca's got us impressively lost. Once we realised we were going in the opposite of the desired direction, the group took over and we reached our destination St. Mark's square at the perfect time.

St. Mark's square is surrounded by the St. Mark's Basilica and Doge's Palace on one side and other official buildings make up the piazza. At day it seethes with tourists but at night it is empty and was on this occassion apart from the knee deep flash lagoon taking up all of it.

We shrieked and ran and jumped and wallowed around in it and then found some chairs and tables from a closed restaurant on the square and took them to the middle of this shimmering lake to chill out and drink and smoke and soak up this semi-phenomona. We spent a few hours there chatting about how cool we were but it was cut short when a guy from Texas drank too much whisky from a 2l Coke bottle and puked in the water we were standing in. We fled from the scene, the floating puke and the policemen calling us to put the tables and chairs back where they belong.